2023 is set to be a massive year for Jonathan Majors. Sure, he’s got “Creed III” coming in March. But before that, he has his first major introduction into the Marvel Cinematic Universe (after a brief cameo in “Loki” a couple of years ago) in “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.” And with that, he’s going to get hammered with questions about whether or not Marvel films are “real cinema” and if he’s doing any “real acting” in his role as Kang. Well, Majors is here to say that Marvel films feature plenty of real acting.
Speaking in an interview with Vanity Fair, Jonathan Majors talked about his role as Kang the Conquerer in the upcoming “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.” This is his first major role in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but it definitely won’t be his last, as he’s slated to be the big bad for the next couple of years. Interestingly, none of this would have happened if Majors followed through with almost walking out of his first meeting with the studio.
“I hope this doesn’t bite me in the ass, but I walked out of my Marvel general [meeting],” explained Majors. “This was a long time ago. I had just gotten out of drama school and I’m running around town and I’m sitting in the office. I grew up in a very particular way and I don’t want to waste nobody’s time. So I got in there and they’re just busy. And I was like, ‘I’m supposed to be here, right?’ It got long and I went, ‘I’m just going to go. It’s cool. I’ll just go.’”
He added, “And I got to the door, but then they said [casting director] Sarah Finn was going to come. We got in the room and we chatted. We were having this great conversation. I think it was three years later that we had the Kang chat. And there’s no trepidation now, especially because of who Kang is. When I said yes, we got the whole picture, and what is being laid out is cohesive.”
In another interview, this time with EW, Majors rebuts all those claims that the actors in the Marvel films aren’t actually doing any “real acting.”
“I think the biggest prejudice toward the MCU films is that [some critics] say, ‘Oh, it’s a comic book movie,'” Majors said. “That actually really hurts your feelings, you know? As an artist, you go, ‘Well, what does that mean?’ I think it’s a mean thing to say. There’s this idea that there’s a certain way you have to act in these movies and it’s not ‘real acting.’ But I’ve watched all of them, and I know it’s real acting. There’s a certain style to it, like anything: Shakespeare, Chekhov, August Wilson, Katori Hall. There’s a certain style to it, of course, but the flesh-and-blood element, the talking and listening element is extremely there.”
So, in the ongoing fight between cinephiles and the Marvel film fandom, it appears Jonathan Majors is ready to join his MCU fans in defending his work over the next few years. And judging by his work in “Loki” and ‘Quantumania,’ Majors is definitely going to prove that he can show off some real range in his portrayal of Kang.
“Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” debuts in theaters on February 17.
